Stained Glass Moves From Cathedral to Living Room

By Marcus Bennett

Rafael Calvo, owner of San Gabriel glass art company Tico Tech, currently has 18 windows on order — most of them for houses, not churches. That single order book tells the story: stained glass, a medium whose oldest surviving example dates to roughly 686 AD at St. Paul's Monastery in Jarrow, England, has crossed decisively into residential work.

California designer Sarah Giesenhagen, creative director of the Bureau, estimates she has specified patterned, colorful glass in "almost every project" in recent years. Her verdict on client reactions: "No [client] has turned it down so far. It is an awe-inducing, experiential win."

What changed for practitioners?

The medium carries religious baggage it does not need. Design historian Alessandra Wood, PhD, explains that stained glass became synonymous with Gothic architecture and biblical storytelling for a mostly illiterate medieval population — the Sainte-Chapelle in Paris packs 1,113 panels with scenes from Genesis to the Resurrection.

Residential work inverts that logic. The draw now is human touch, not scripture. "In an increasingly digital world, people are interested in the handmade," says Leah Ring of Another Human, who recently installed a checkered window in a San Francisco bathroom. She adds: "There's a comfort to an element that is still being done in, by and large, the same way it always has been."

Calvo describes the process: many makers still blow glass into a large bottle shape, cut it, and go about "filleting the glass as flat as possible."

Where the commissions are landing

Pasadena artist Scotlan Goldbeck brought the trend home literally, adding a window of amorphous blue, green and orange blobs to her 1906 Craftsman during a renovation by Los Angeles firm LAUN. Debbie Bean crafted the glass. "There's something spiritual about the different ways light shines through it," Goldbeck says. "It feels simultaneously ancient and present."

LAUN has placed groovy glasswork in seven projects — and counting — across kitchens, entry gates and principal rooms, including principal Rachel Bullock's own home. Bean also built an interior hallway window for a two-story artist flat by Unfold Projects, whose art director Stacy Kelley notes the practical appeal: "It creates an environment that brightens and fades over the course of a day."

How to specify it well

Practical guidance from the designers now working with the medium:

• Check the site. Australian designer Jase Sullivan warns that "the sky and weather might affect your design" — clear panels read blue on sunny days, grayer when overcast. He favors "earthier, warmer colors that reflect beautifully on the space and skin."
• Go geometric. Sullivan commissioned a Mondrian-inspired arrangement for a Sydney house, which he says removes the material from its "more traditional associations."
• Start with a grid. Bullock calls the simple grid fail-safe: "It's flexible, so you can take it in a lot of directions with varying textures and colors."
• Personalize. Calvo once depicted two cats traipsing through branches to "immortalize" his clients' pets.
• Place it deliberately. LAUN's Molly Purnell advises: "It's art, so it should be placed somewhere you can stop, look at it, and take it all in."

What it costs and how to maintain it

Maintenance is simple: skip bleach and ammonia, use a gentle formula such as Sprayway's foaming cleaner on a soft microfiber cloth, and never spray directly onto the surface. Bean cautions against pressure: "Localized pressure can weaken solder joints or crack."

The cost is the constraint. Bean sells small suncatchers for around $100, but commission-based works start around $2,500.

Calvo argues the spend buys something flat glazing cannot: "an elegance to a window space that simple, modern architectural glass cannot achieve." Notre-Dame's 1,100 square feet of vitrails and Gaudí's Technicolor glass at the Sagrada Família suggest the investment ages well.